Architecture Publications
Architecture
2-2017
The Turkish Tea Garden: Exploring a "Third Space"
with Cultural Resonances
Sharon Wohl
Iowa State University, [email protected]
Follow this and additional works at: http://lib.dr.iastate.edu/arch_pubs
Part of the Architecture Commons, and the Near Eastern Languages and Societies Commons
The complete bibliographic information for this item can be found at http://lib.dr.iastate.edu/
arch_pubs/84. For information on how to cite this item, please visit http://lib.dr.iastate.edu/
howtocite.html.
This Article is brought to you for free and open access by the Architecture at Iowa State University Digital Repository. It has been accepted for inclusion
in Architecture Publications by an authorized administrator of Iowa State University Digital Repository. For more information, please contact
[email protected].
The Turkish Tea Garden: Exploring a “Third
Space” with Cultural Resonances
Sharon Wohl
Delft Technical University, The Netherlands
Iowa State University
Abstract
This article examines the history, use, and significance of the Turkish Tea Garden or Cay
Bahcesi, positing that these gardens offer unique democratic spaces for public discourse set
within the polis. The article unpacks the historical, cultural and symbolic features of these
gardens, and the role these shared spaces play in Turkey’s multivalent civic environment. It
employs Ray Oldenburg’s notion of “third space” to consider how these gardens provide
inclusive settings for a culturally diverse citizenry. Further, the paper considers how these spaces
act as repositories of shared memory, mediating conflict that appears in other societal spheres.
The gardens are presented as uniquely “sacred” third spaces, distinct from the “profane” third
spaces characterized by Oldenburg.
Keywords
Tea Gardens, Turkey, Memory, Public Space, Discourse, Third Space
This is the accepted manuscript of an article published in Space and Culture 20 (2017): 56–67, doi:
10.1177/1206331216646058. Posted with permission
Without the public oneiric spaces of the arcade or the square, without the people
who can help us shape and articulate our wishes, we lack places to do our
dreaming. We are left without sites on which to engage each other when we
awake from that dreaming and try to make our wishes real. We are left without
the most basic enabling conditions to create a world worthy of our aspirations.
(Kingwell, 2001, p. 190)
As citizens negotiating the space of the city, we share common terrain with those whom
we see as “other”: those manifesting difference be it through religion, ethnicity, culture,
politics, or socio-economic standing. The city gathers together this variegated collection
of individuals, many of whom have little in common, in spatial performances of
politeness, propriety and publicity. In this pluralist world, cities cannot be conceived as
homogenous entities in which citizens subscribe to a shared set of values and beliefs.
Rather, cities must provide the cultural platform for a diverse citizenry, offering ways to
navigate rather than eliminate political difference (Kingwell, 2001).
Author Note:
Sharon Wohl is an Assistant Professor in the Architecture Program at Iowa State University, as well as a
PhD Candidate in Spatial Planning and Strategy at Delft Technical University. Prior to working at Iowa
State, she practiced with 5468796 Architecture, an internationally recognized firm.
An earlier version of this paper was presented at The International Praxis Conference on Cultural
Memory and Coexistence, in Istanbul, Turkey.
Settings that mediate these civic differences function as what urban sociologist Ray
Oldenburg (1989) refers to as “third spaces” – interstitial locales where citizens from all
walks of life converge in a casual setting for discourse. Oldenburg is interested in these
particular places as settings where individuals engage in social contact with those from
differing backgrounds. He cites pubs, barbershops and coffeehouses as examples of such
spaces – environments distinct from the private realm of the home or the public realm of
the workplace.i Yet all his examples point to environments that hold no particular
cultural or spiritual significance for their users. Instead, they function as what Mercia
Eliade (1987) refers to as “profane” space, holding no deeper collective cultural
resonance.
This article examines the history, use and role of a specific type of third space – the Tea
Garden, or Cay Bahcesi. Using a combination of site observations, personal interviews,
ethnographic research and academic sources, I trace the historical, cultural and symbolic
features of these gardens, and the role these shared spaces play in Turkey’s modern-day
evolving, multivalent civic environment. I posit that these gardens, found throughout
Turkey, provide a unique sacred third space within the structure of the polis, offering
open, democratic, social spaces for public discourse within a setting that evokes deeply
shared cultural meanings.
In the first section, I trace the historical and cultural backdrop that converges within the
locus of the Tea Garden -- examining both coffeehouse traditions and a fusion of eastern
garden traditions -- in order to explore the role these precedents play in generating
common meaning and values in today’s Cay Bahcesi. I then consider the need for
Oldenburg’s places of civility and common ground and how this need is particularly
acute within Turkey’s contemporary political and cultural context. Finally, I move on to
examine present-day uses of the Tea Garden, considering their significance as sites that
allow common cultural practices to be performed. I argue that the Cay Bahcesi, by
providing the spatial context in which to situate these practices, offer unique value as
shared cultural touchstones that help open gates of tolerance.
Section 1: Historic Influences
a. The Coffeehouse Tradition
The cultural practice of providing and enjoying refreshments within the Turkish public
sphere can be traced back to civic amenities found within early Ottoman settlements.
Historically, public fountains and kiosks (sebils), served as gathering nodes that
distributed water, sweetened drinks, and juices to passersby. These “refreshment
amenities”, predate the establishment of coffeehouses, but suggest how infrastructure
serving the need for refreshments held a privileged place within the public sphere
(Hamadeh, 2008; Onay & Uğurlu, 2010). With the emergence of the coffeehouse
tradition, this function took on deeper social and cultural dimensions.
Coffeehouses emerged from the Near East, arriving in Istanbul from Yemen in the mid
1500s. Initially, the beverage was consumed by members of the Sufi order, ostensibly to
help them stay awake during their all-night devotional practices. Sufis drew their
membership from a broad range of social and economic strata, and were widely respected
within the broader community. The consumption of coffee by Sufis, as part of their
spiritual activities, imparted upon the beverage a sense of cultural legitimacy --helping
prompt its widespread acceptance amongst the general public (Hattox, 2000).
Coffeehouses came to be subsidized by the local wealthy elites, as part of their private
contribution towards the public good. Their revenue streams contributed to the Vakifs
(religious endowments), which supported the mosque and its works (Hamadeh, 2008;
Ozkocak, 2007). Coffeehouses were therefore often located near mosques and were
considered an integral part of the religious complex.
By the end of the 16th century Turks had embraced coffee and coffeehouses as an
important new social institution, with this new gathering space exerted a sweeping effect
upon the social practices of Istanbul’s inhabitants. Acts of hospitality and sociability, by
being granted cultural legitimacy through their association with the mosque complexes,
could for the first time be respectfully transferred from the private domain of the home
into the public domain of the city. For less wealthy citizens, who lacked homes large
enough to receive visitors, coffeehouses could be used as a stand-in -- a space where one
citizen could host another within the public realm (Mikhail, 2007). Coffeehouses thereby
emerged as inclusive forums, frequented by people from a wide of array of social
statures, including “beys, nobles, officers, teachers, judges and other people of the law”
(d’Ohsson, 1788, cited in Hattox, 2000, p. 93). Here, citizens could enjoy sociability,
entertainment, and the exchange of information (Hattox, 2000). Unlike stratified social
environments, coffeehouses offered “egalitarianism, congeniality and conversation”
(Ellis, 2008, p. 157). While repeatedly the subject of government closures, the popularity
of coffeehouses continued to spread and, being a major source of tax revenues, their
status as an urban fixture eventually stabilized (Artan, 2011).
The Garden within the Coffeehouse context
Ralph Hattox (2000) identifies three types of coffeehouses: the take-out stall, the modest
shop, and the grand “house-style” coffeehouse that included an outdoor component.
Hattox describes the coffee garden environment as offering, “a park or gardenlike
atmosphere … surround[ing] the patron with refreshing sights and sounds unlike those of
either the city or the desert” (2000, p. 81). He also refers to the presence of outdoor mats,
shade trees, trellises, and large benches. Descriptions of this outdoor aspect of
coffeehouses are also found in various traveller diaries. In Julia Pardoe’s accounts of
Istanbul, for example, she describes “a long street, terminating at the water’s edge […]
overshadowed by limes and acacias, beneath which are coffee terraces; constantly
thronged with Turks, sitting gravely in groups upon low stools not more than half a foot
from the ground” (quoted by Hamadeh, 2008: 121, see also Johnson, 1922, p. 262).
Coffeehouses are described as extending into the street (Tokman, 2001), where the
coffeehouse opens “onto a courtyard surrounded on three sides by wooden platforms with
a pool and fountain in the center” (Isin, 2003, p. 88). Engraved plates depicting life in the
16th century provide further information about these outdoor spaces, with depictions that
include those of kiosks along the Bosphorus, and cafés located near water features
(Melling, 1807). Also identified are the games played at coffeehouses -- with
backgammon, chess, and mankala being illustrated.
From these sources we understand that outdoor coffee gardens were an important
compliment to the indoor coffeehouse experience. Nonetheless, while coffeehouses have
been extensively studied, there is little documentation of their outdoor aspect.
Consequently, our image of the coffeehouse is generally limited to that of either an
interior space or, if outdoors, one that is somewhat analogous to a sidewalk café. Yet the
coffee garden constituted a significant place for social gathering in its own right. These
coffeehouse gardens provide a key spatial precedent for the Turkish Tea Garden, both in
terms of their functional and physical components.
The shift from Coffee to Tea
Russian and Balkan immigrants who moved to Istanbul in the late 19th century brought
with them the new custom of teahouses (and the gardens associated with them). These
proved popular, in part due to tea being an inexpensive alternative to coffee (Tokman,
2001). In 1878 a Turkish governor wrote a pamphlet promoting the health benefits of tea,
entitled the “Çay Risalesi”. This helped prompt the introduction of several teahouses in
Istanbul and other cities (though coffee still dominated). But the full import of tea as a
national drink emerged only after 1923. With the disintegration of the Ottoman Empire
(and the loss of Yemen, Turkey’s main source of coffee), Turkey was forced to import
much more expensive coffee from Brazil. In 1924, in an effort to develop greater self–
reliance, the government established a series of national tea plantations. Thereafter, tea
became a much less expensive alternative to coffee. The ubiquity of tea drinking was
further accelerated due to the fact that, in many areas, its consumption was considered to
be safer than that of water (Ger & Kravets, 2009).
Following Ataturk’s modernization program for Turkey, greater provision was made for
the creation of public parks, with Tea Gardens becoming an important municipal feature
within these environments. While each neighborhood (mahalle) maintained parochial
local coffeehouses, much more broadly attended municipal Tea Gardens were created at
important civic sites, including those that had once been used as excursion grounds
(Evyapan, 1999). These municipal sites, as opposed to “belonging” to the more insular
confines of the mahalle, attracted citizens from all parts of the city. The gardens became
increasingly popular as socially inclusive environments, which “brought men and women
together at the same table” in keeping with the desired “European etiquette” (Isin, 2003,
p. 163). As part of the modernization project of Turkey, it was important that women
have a visible place within public parks, thus removing the gender obstacles that
remained intact within the neighborhood coffeehouses. Further, with Istanbul’s
population growing rapidly, many families were moving into smaller homes that lacked
gathering spaces to host friends. People therefore increasingly frequented Tea Gardens as
spaces to meet. This combination of factors led to the increasing popularity of Tea
Gardens in the 1950s as sites for families and friends to gather. The modern Cay Bahcesi,
occupying a central position in the urban fabric, nonetheless enfolds practices that can be
traced back to the 16th century coffee gardens (Ger & Kravets, 2009).
b. Garden Traditions
I wish to now consider the particular symbolic significance of gardens as the sites
wherein tea is consumed. Garden traditions in Turkey draw upon a variety of influences:
Islamic Paradisal garden traditions; Royal Pleasure gardens; and Turkic nomadic
excursion grounds. While the social act of coffee drinking can be traced as the functional
and social precedent of the Tea Garden, these various garden types provide the physical
and symbolic precedents.
The idea of the Garden as Paradise, a sacred and visionary space, derives from early
Islamic teachings. The word paradise comes from the Persian word pairidaeza referring
to a walled enclosure (Moynihan, 1979). Islamic gardens were conceived as being a
reflection of the heavenly paradise. Vivid descriptions of heaven depicted within the
Koran gave guidance as to how these earthly gardens should be conceived with,
“greenery, gushing fountains, rivers, delicious food and sensual beauty” (Schimmel,
1976, pp. 17–18). Rulers would pride themselves on creating this man-made version of
paradise -- conceived as a form of worship -- that linked the world of the mundane below
to that of the sacred above. Wealthy Muslims, as a testament of their devotion, would
endeavor to create this, “paradise-like, cool and green garden” that “elevated the attitude
towards nature, to the realm of religion” (Evyapan, 1986, p. 10).
These Islamic Paradisal gardens stood in opposition to their surrounding environments,
constructed as walled oasis encompassing streams, trees and pavilions. The garden
palette included water, trees, the division of earth into quarters, and the elevation of the
mountain. Features such as the terracing of the garden were representative of varying
levels of bliss (Moynihan, 1979). These paradisal gardens were intended to absorb
peoples of different backgrounds and economic standing within their midst, providing a
space of shared cultural practices experienced and performed through conversation,
hospitality, love of nature and sociability. They not only served as locales for pleasure,
leisure and the enjoyment of nature, but were also charged with symbolic content. The
physical elements and spatial organization of the garden brought heavenly symbols to
bear upon the secular activities of earth.
In contrast, Royal Pleasure gardens were a hedonistic space, conceived as outdoor spaces
intended for the daily life and leisure of the court (MacDougall & Ettinghausen, 1974).
The Sultan and his court would hold excursions to gardens in both urban locations and
suburban estates (Brookshaw, 2003). Thirteenth Century documents describe Seljuk
lands and villages, and include references to, “pools and gardens and orchards and other
trees […] and gathering places for residents and playing grounds for youth” (Turan,
quoted in Redford, 2000, p. 317). Construction of these gardens was inspired by an
Islamic body of literature that made specific reference to the provision of public gardens
as being associated with an ideal vision of governance, reflecting a just ruler (Redford,
2000). Thus, between the 11th and 13th centuries, Persian rulers would undertake the
construction of gardens in order to convey both their power and sense of justice
(Brookshaw, 2003). The royal pleasure grounds hosted scholarly as well as casual
gatherings, wherein people enjoyed wine, food, dancing, poets, and musicians
(Brookshaw, 2003). They were typically situated so as to take advantage of dramatic
views, allowing the Sultan to survey his holdings, and included small structures and tent
pavilions in which the Sultan could receive visitors. In the eighteenth century the royal
pleasure gardens were made increasingly public as excursion grounds available to all
social strata (Artan, 2011; Hamadeh, 2008). After the collapse of the Ottoman Empire it
is these gardens that became public amenities, maintaining their role as excursion sites.
As mentioned, the fact that these gardens were not considered the territory of any
particular group made them much more inclusive settings compared to the local mahalle
gathering sites.
A final factor coloring the nature of the Turkish garden is the nomadic character of the
Turkic peoples. These roots led them to engage in a highly active use of gardens, placing
within them functions that one would normally expect to be found within buildings. This
practical uses of garden settings resonated with the nomadic use of the outdoors -- where
nature is not so much brought under control, but adapted to serve everyday life (Seckin,
2003). Thus, while the Turks inherited key aspects of the Persian Garden tradition, they
quickly adapted these for pragmatic requirements: altering the contemplative nature of
the garden so that it could instead serve as an active setting for day-to-day life
(Moynihan, 1979). While the geometry of traditional Persian gardens is formalized, with
a specific organization of space intended to evoke paradise, the Turkish garden layout is
conceived in a much more informal manner, in keeping with Nomadic traditions
(Evyapan, 1986). In contrast to the inward looking Persian settings, Turkish gardens
came to be outward looking, chosen for views, irrigation and weather conditions. They
included naturalistic elements such as fountains, pools, pavilions and flowers. Gardens
were also often situated at civic focal points near mosques and coffeehouses (Seckin,
2003). The Turkish garden therefore distinguishes itself from the Persian garden
tradition insofar as it treats the natural environment as a semi-tamed venue for sociability,
a place of social excursion rather than a rustic and wild setting for retreat or a sacred
venue for contemplation. It is thus more informal, active, and naturalistic, while
remaining rife with symbolic content (Evyapan, 1986).
c. Turkish Tea Gardens Today
This specifically Turkish integration of the various garden traditions outlined above
manifests itself in today’s Tea Gardens. These are characterized by: informal layouts;
water features; prime views; various options in terms of seating arrangements; and
generous spacing between tables to allow for privacy. Local Tea Gardens are found
within neighborhoods, but civic Tea Gardens are either prominently located adjacent to
municipal buildings, or situated to take advantage of views or natural features. The
boundary condition of the garden is clearly demarcated from the surrounding urban
fabric, often with a low wall or elevation shift, creating a disjuncture with the everyday
life of the city. In keeping with Turkish traditional use of outdoor space, people come to
the Tea Gardens for unhurried relaxation, family events, conversation or games.
These gardens, I suggest, provide the third spaces Oldenburg regards as so important in
establishing a meeting ground for disparate voices, but are unique insofar as they do so
within sacred rather than profane space. This is in sharp contrast to the bars, bowling
alleys and barbershops so often constituting the “third spaces” normally cited.
Section 2: Mediation and Civility in the Public Sphere
There is in fact no Kantian standard of universal rationality functioning beneath
all our particularities, and so political stability cannot be secured by stripping
those particularities away. Subordinating one’s particularity to that false
universal only means losing one’s self, not preserving it. The political imperative,
then, is not to secure individual rights under a larger political structure of
generalized, and therefore empty respect, but to demand real respect for my
particularity in the uniquely valuable project of living my life. (Kingwell, 2001,
p. 54)
I wish to now turn to the contemporary political and social significance of the Tea
Garden, outlining some of the discussions bearing upon our understanding of social
interactions in the public domain, and moving on to the specifics of how this applies to
the Tea Garden. I argue that Tea Gardens sit outside of contemporary secularized Turkish
space and in so doing tap into shared cultural memory.
Jurgen Habermas (1991) presents a detailed analysis of how citizens come together in the
public realm, drawing our attention to the political importance of the public sphere.
Making a distinction between interests that are private in nature and those affecting the
civitas, he argues that the authority of a democratic government is insured, in part, by the
fact that it represents viewpoints derived by an informed populace. Only in the context of
the public sphere can individuals come together, leave their solely private pursuits
behind, and arrive at consensus regarding the common good. In order for democracies to
have a rational mandate for governance, there needs to be a sphere wherein such debate
can occur. In the past, Habermas argues, coffeehouses and salons -- Oldenburg’s third
spaces -- played a vital role as the physical infrastructure wherein this debate could arise.
Habermas’ views on the public sphere reflect a Universalist perspective, building upon
Enlightenment ideals. He valorizes the public sphere as being indispensable in a
democracy -- but he ties this to a quest for a singular version of truth. In his thesis, there
exists within the polis a dialectic encounter: wherein citizens with differing backgrounds
and beliefs are able to meet within the public sphere for dialogue and gradually, through a
rational encounter amongst informed speakers, come to a place of understanding and
shared belief. Without this public sphere of encounter, people are confined to their own
parochial beliefs and perspectives, and knowledge is limited to what they already “know”
to be true.
Post-Modern thinkers are critical of Habermas’ failure to adequately problematize how
differences in perspective are not always resolvable through arrival at a common
viewpoint (Kapoor, 2002; Mouffe, 1999). They also argue that he incorrectly assumes an
equality of voices having access to public debate, whereas the public sphere is in fact a
socially distorted environment – one wherein not all voices are equally expressed and
heard -- and hence no universal truth can emerge. In addition, they find deeply
problematic the perspective that valorizes a quest for a singular legitimate truth ”out
there”, instead proposing a multiplicity of co-existing and contingent truths. Amongst his
critics, philosopher Mark Kingwell questions his basis for a normative, universalizing
objective for public debate, and similarly problematizes the productive capacity of
reason. Kingwell argues:
This drive for a common language of political discussion is in some ways admirable, since it
seeks to resolve disagreements rather than simply eliminate them, but at a fundamental level it is
misconceived. Some ethical and political differences simply do not go away; some conflicts can
never be resolved, only managed […] We often have genuinely differences with those who share
our political fate. We may dislike those we have to live with, or simply be indifferent to them.
And yet these divergences will not surrender to reason, no matter how assiduous and extensive
our attempts to resolve them in that way. (2001, pp. 87, 89)
Kingwell’s claims for the public sphere place a greater emphasis on generating tolerance
amongst citizens, rather than transcendent truth. In his view, the aim of the public sphere
is not to eliminate conflict, but rather to mediate it. Kingwell goes further, stating that
differing viewpoints, and the inherent conflict associated with them, have a productive
role to play in contributing to a just, democratic society – albeit as long as these
differences are negotiated in a civil manner (see also Mouffe, 1999). It is rather the
suppression of conflict that has destructive tendencies in limiting free expression.
Similarly, while there is growing concern about secular/Islamist rifts becoming more
apparent in contemporary Turkish society, many argue that the masking of these rifts
under the nationalist myth of a “Modern” Turkey has been equally destructive. The
Turkish Republic deliberately attempted to break with memories, symbols and religious
beliefs of the past, in a revisionist “official” version of “Turkishness” that aimed to
secularize society (Kucukcan, 2003). These reforms left gaping holes in the realms of
tradition and cultural practices -- with shared ideals of Turkishness in large part an
invention of a secular state struggling to manufacture a unified identity in the aftermath
of Ottoman rule. This singular political unity of the country belied underlying disunities
of culture, ethnicity and religion.
A growing body of work now challenges the so-called success of Turkey’s modernization
“project” (Kasaba & Bozdogan, 1997), problematizing the Turkish Republic’s
homogenizing state narrative. Today, ethnic tensions suppressed through the unifying
myth of a National Turkic identity have unraveled in the ongoing struggle with Kurdish
peoples, who seek recognition of their distinct language and culture. Economic pressures
have led to increasing rural to urban migrations, forcing seasoned urbanites to share
spaces of encounter with those perceived as “backward” newcomers (Robins & Aksoy,
1995). In this context, contested urbanities driven by religion or ethnicity, though present,
have become less significant than cultural and economic distinctions. These rifts are
increasingly bearing down upon a society struggling to mediate between ethnic, religious,
socio-economic, and political tensions within the shared space of the polis.
These tensions have amplified as Turkey’s political leadership increasingly realigns the
country towards an Islamist identity. The AKP (Justice and Development Party) has
embarked on a controversial cultural agenda to reassert Turkey’s Ottoman heritage, long
subsumed under the narrative of Ataturk’s modernization and secularization project. But
this reintroduction of Islamist symbols into the Turkish public sphere can be read in
contested ways -- as indicative of a retrograde conservatism that threatens to suppress
liberties associated with Republican modernization or, alternately, as a reclamation of
specific cultural identities and distinctions, subsumed in an uncritical race to accept
Western normative values (Çinar, 2005; Kasaba & Bozdogan, 1997).
Thus, depending upon the perspective taken, one can view the veiling of women in public
space as either entailing freedom of personal expression or as a return to conservative
religious restrictions; similarly, one can see the appearance of unveiled women in
Kemalist public space as either a function of liberalization under Ataturk’s reforms, or as
evidence of the Kemalist appropriation of women’s bodies as convenient tools for Statist
propaganda, serving an elitist political agenda (Arat, 1997). Each reading is possible, and
perspectives shift in accordance with individual situations. Thus, while secularists worry
about the gradual normalization of the headscarf, members of the gay/lesbian
communities join in protesting the ban of the headscarf at universities in a show of
solidarity for freedom of expression. Similarly, a population of Islamists and secularists,
Kurds, and LGBTTQ activists came together in the Gezi Park protests, rallying against a
government seen by all as becoming increasingly authoritarian (Ors, 2014). Secular
Turks at times support an Islamist government in order to ensure economic stability,
whilst simultaneously rejecting Islamist ideology. While the Islamist tendencies of the
AKP have generated controversy, that has not stopped both Liberals and Islamists from
launching criticisms towards the earlier Kemalist project, increasingly seen by all as
being paternalistic and authoritarian, negating, “the historical and cultural experience of
the people of Turkey” (Kasaba & Bozdogan, 1997, p. 4). In Turkey today, neat divisions
of identities fail to remain fixed and static, and simple binaries -- conservative/modern,
Kurdish/Turkish, secular/fundamentalist -- unravel in the face of complexities manifested
in lived experience (Turam, 2012, 2013).
Turkish public space holds together this array of shifting identities, often at odds but also
mediated within specific contexts of unified vision. Many average Turks lament what
they see as a political desire to cause rifts amongst the populace, where seemingly
polarizing issues concerning “veiled versus unveiled” or “secular versus Islamist”, are
amplified by political activists, but are not perceived as resonating with lived experience
(see also Heper, 2011, who analyzes opinion polls confirming this perspective). Thus,
“the plurality one finds on streets still defy the simplified ideological polarization that
pits secularists and Islamists against each other with seemingly clear faultlines”
(Gökarıksel, 2011, p. 12). Increasingly, global economic dynamics are bringing a diverse
citizenry together in urban space, rubbing shoulder to shoulder as previously isolated
groups begin to inhabit the same milieu: dissolving boundaries that once held difference
apart. This creates new tensions as the public sphere becomes a much more complex
space to navigate, at risk of fracturing into insular segments, held separate by
demarcation lines made physical or perceptual (Davis, 1992). And yet rather than being
oppositional, day-to-day experience in Turkey is often mediated by more nuanced “inbetween” spaces of encounter, ones offering possibilities for shifting identities.
Oldenburg’s third spaces are the locales wherein the Habermasian play of civility and
dialogue occur, but in the Turkish instance, it becomes clear that finding a “universal” set
of values within the public realm is no longer possible (nor desirable). Further,
“affinities, shared goals and political alliances also originate from contested urban space,
where interaction, albeit propelled by uncomfortable proximities, is preferable to
segregation” (Turam, 2013, p. 426, emphasis added). I believe Tea Gardens offer one
such contested space: a space occupied by many where the enactment of shared practices
establishes common ground and where conflicts, at least temporarily, can be suspended.
Rather then seeing the Tea Garden as somewhere along yet another conceptual binary -one that juxtaposes “liberal/modern” alcohol serving establishments against
“backward/conservative” Cay Bahcesi -- Tea Gardens occupy a much more nuanced
social hybrid, one that taps into shared memory and mythos.
Section Three: Tea Gardens as Shared Cultural Touchstones?
Human memory is spatial. The shaping of space is an instrument for the shaping
of memory. A shared space – such as a street – can be a locus of collective
memory…it can express the accumulation of memories from below, through the
physical and associative traces left by interweaving patterns of everyday life.
(Hebbert, 2005, p. 592)
Geographer Amy Mills, in her study of cultural co-existence in Istanbul, highlights the
specific role that memory serves as a vehicle for constructing shared beliefs and identities
(2010). Mills identifies how physical space can provide the infrastructure that memory
cleaves to, “the social space through and on which memory is constructed” where we
“imagine, narrate and practice the social relationships that make us who we are” (Amy
Mills, 2010, p. 205). Yet many everyday spaces of life are without history, without
memory. This was, in fact, a core part of the Kemalist agenda, best exemplified in the
selection of Ankara -- a town with no historical “baggage” per say -- as the state’s new
capital (Sargin, 2004). The Kemalist program, with its aim to break from the Ottoman
past, led Turks to associate a sense of shame and embarrassment with anything tied to a
heritage seen as decadent and backwards (Çinar, 2008).
But this break with memory left Turks in an uneasy relationship both in regards to their
conceptions of a shared past and their ambitions for a shared future. A disconnect
between a desired and imagined Western superiority versus the actuality of lived
experience continues to be enacted today. Westernized consumer spaces have colonized
the Turkish public domain with an endless barrage of international corporate brands and
logos, and with spatial environments that could exist equally in Ankara or London.
Meaning, if any, associated with these malls and chains has been manufactured by
marketers. At the same time, these spaces are viscerally biased toward a sense of western
superiority -- the notion that “modern” values associated with consumption in the West
are somehow an improvement over the “backwardness” of the Eastern Bazaar. Seen
within this context, the popularity of Tea Gardens can be viewed either as evidence of
culturally conservative nostalgia (arabesque) or as an empowering reclamation of a
heritage censured through the glorification of Western values.
Much of the struggle being enacted in Turkish society today involves this quest to
reclaim authenticity: to seek roots tied to specificities of culture and place. Two young
scholars from Turkey provided me with one anecdotal example of how this search for
shared meanings is performed. They related how in the 1990s a series of western-style
café’s opened in Istanbul. Initially, many young people wanted to go to experience that
culture, but over time the seduction of these environments waned (see also Tokman,
2001, who discusses the same phenomena). Instead there was a desire to return to one’s
own roots at the Tea Gardens, where people felt at home rather than on show. The unique
sense of place experienced in these gardens had to do with a feeling that these
environments were uniquely Turkish, embodying shared values. What was expressed to
me was that in the gardens the posture one took felt natural and unaffected. This was is
in contrast with the Westernized cafés, where the pressures of everyday life and
appearances continued to bear down upon patrons, even as they took their coffee breaks.
This distinction between gardens and cafés was a recurrent theme in my interviews,
where subjects reported a different relationship with time in these settings (see also Ger
& Kravets, 2009). In the gardens, one could “spend hours” without pressure and “tea is
offered” rather than sold. Cafés, in contrast, were seen as spaces of consumption where
ordinary (and secular) time continued to prevail.
The use of the Tea Garden is ubiquitous across Turkey, transcending other differences
and in many instances otherwise segregated groups come together in these venues. One
interviewee noted that “Turkish people will fight anywhere, but not in Tea Gardens”.
Echoing this sentiment, anthropologist Christopher Houston observes how conflicts and
suspicions are temporarily suspended within the Tea Garden, allowing new relations
amongst people to be imagined. The space performs, “as neutral ground by both Islamist
and laic subjects …[where] the ‘dark’ and ‘civilized’ faces of Islam sip tea, drop crumbs
and fill ashtrays side by side, sometimes even at the same table” (2001, p. 86). Similarly,
a newspaper columnist describing the array of identities co-mingling in a Tea Garden in
Bursa, writes, “most of the young women wear the loose-fitting headscarves traditional in
Turkey; others, the more elaborate and constraining ones that are a mark of newer
currents in political Islam. Still others are on the dance floor, uncovered, bare-armed,
dancing in an implausibly immodest way” (Caldwell, 2005).
Here diverse identities occupy the same public sphere -- tolerating difference in a nod to
possible co-existence (Secor, 2004). The performance of shared social practices involving
leisure, conversation, games, and tea-drinking point to a common heritage and fate, while
their re-constitution makes it possible to imagine a peaceful co-existence in the future.
The power of these unifying social practices forms bridges of understanding between
those who are otherwise at odds. Thus, if “my” belief and practice echoes “your” belief
and practice, if we are able to honour the same rituals and rites of everyday life, then it
becomes increasingly difficult to identify you as “other”. The customs and cultural
practices of the Tea Garden hold symbolic meaning for all who engage this space,
whether perceived through the lens of religious doctrine, or from a secularist standpoint.
The performance of these practices are, in turn, a re-enactment of mythic ideals from the
past -- pointing to open, respectful cosmopolitanism.
I am well aware that this nostalgic yearning for a multi-cultural inclusive past is complex
and that the trope of cosmopolitan tolerance is not innocent. It masks inconvenient truths
that fail to congeal with the narrative of tolerance (Hanley, 2008). Furthermore, while
seemingly appearing as “inclusive” there is also a sense that the concept of
“cosmopolitanism” is linked to a European sensibility towards inclusion -- valorizing a
sort of liberal and Western “person of the world” versus granting cosmopolitan status to
“multiple distinct persons in the world”. This need for a truly inclusive public sphere that
includes all practices of Turks is particularly acute today. But the ubiquity of “Ottoman
mulit-ethnic tolerance” as a common cultural trope, cited by “leftists, human rights
activists, secularists, and intellectuals, as well as Islamist politicians and conservatives”
(A. Mills, 2011, p. 193), nonetheless points to a common desire for an acceptance of
plurality -- a resistance to the hegemonic imposition of a singular Nationalist rhetoric.
In many locales within the city, it is difficult to preserve, empower, and reproduce this
mythic memory of tolerance. The division of cities like Istanbul into specific insular
neighborhoods keeps individuals apart, establishes distinct territories, and propagates
notions of perceived difference. But Turkey, and Istanbul in particular, is a complex and
uneven terrain holding both spaces of segregation and areas of rapprochement (Secor,
2004). Due to their spatial lineage as special territories situated in unique settings of the
city, Tea Gardens cannot be claimed by any one specific group. They are not defined by a
particular neighborhood or mahalle, but are instead bridging nodes that “belong” to the
citizenry as a whole. They thereby exist perceptually as a special case within the urban
fabric, as apart from the city now as they were in the past when walled off as heavenly
enclosures. This sacred space allows for a conceptual disjuncture with the surrounding
“profane” city and its tensions, and for special types of behaviors to unfold within their
demarcation lines.
The Tea Garden reconstitutes and concretizes memories surrounding a place where it is
possible to interact peacefully with one another.ii It holds commonly shared visceral
associations with both sacred notions of the Earthly Paradise and Coffeehouse virtues of
openness, respect, and civility -- associations that pre-date many contemporary sources
of conflict. These associations weave together shared history, culture practices, and
sacred symbolism, to confer an elevated meaning upon the act of social gathering (in
contrast to Oldenburg’s profane third spaces). Within the Cay Bahcesi memories are reenacted within a spatial setting that exists as part of an unbroken tradition, a milieux de
memoire where memory remains embodied as social practice, taking root “in the
concrete, in spaces, gestures, images and objects” (Nora, 1989, p. 9). The gardens act as a
specific locality where memory and narrative are gathered in a space with shared cultural
allusions to the sacred. The gardens serve as repositories of shared customs, collective
beliefs, and historic memories -- including those real, imagined, and mythic in substance.
In order to build a truly inclusive Turkish Society, one able to accommodate difference
rather than merely suppress it under state ideology, there need to be spaces that allow
different factions of society to come together and begin to envisage common dreams
under a socially agreed upon narrative of peaceful co-existence. Opening the notion of
cosmopolitanism up beyond its Western connotations to allow for multiple identities, is
key to creating “in-between” places that allow for mediated, multiple and divergent
identities (Ors, 2002). Peace and tolerance may need to begin with imagination, with
constructing narratives and memory: tolerance may at times be temporary and contingent;
more mythic than real; and co-existence may be more about pointing towards a desired
future then providing an accurate representation of present or past. But this does not
diminish the productive capacity of this shared mythos to weave peoples together,
regardless of whether or not it masks historical inaccuracies, or glosses over present-day
contradictions. In order to build a society for the future, spaces of memory that point to a
respectful relationship in the past can act as powerful cultural touchstones to generate
unifying ties amongst disparate peoples. Here, the Cay Bahcesi offers a unique, sacred,
third space to concretize the dreams and aspirations of peaceful co-existence.
References
Arat, Y. (1997). The Project of Modernity and Women in Turkey. In S. Bozdogan & R.
Kasaba (Eds.), Rethinking modernity and national identity in Turkey (p. 95).
University of Washington Press.
Artan, T. (2011). Forms and Forums of Expression : Istanbul and beyond, 1600-1800 (pp.
378–405).
Brookshaw, D. P. (2003). Palaces, Pavilions and Pleasure-gardens: the context and
setting of the medieval majlis. Middle Eastern Literatures, 6(2), 199–223.
Caldwell, C. (2005). The East in the West. The New York Times Magazine.
Çinar, A. (2005). Modernity, Islam, And Secularism In Turkey: Bodies, Places, And Time.
University of Minnesota Press.
Çinar, A. (2008). Subversion and Sujugation in the Public Sphere: Secularism and the
Islamic Headscarf. Chicago Jounals, 33(4), 891–913.
d’Ohsson Mouradgea. (1788). Tableau général de l’Empire othoman [General Picture of
the Ottoman Empire]. Paris, Imprimerie de monsieur [Firmin Didot].
Davis, M. (1992). City of Quartz: Excavating the Future in Los Angeles (Reprint.).
Vintage.
Eliade, M. (1987). The Sacred and The Profane: The Nature of Religion. (W. R. Trask,
Trans.). Harcourt Brace Jovanovich.
Ellis, M. (2008). An introduction to the coffee-house: A discursive model. Language &
Communication, 28(2), 156–164.
Evyapan, G. A. (1986). The Intrinsic Values of the Traditional Anatolian Turkish
Garden. Design: Journal of the Islamic Environmental Design.
Evyapan, G. A. (1999). The Development of an Ottoman Gardening Style in Istanbul. In
Old Turkish Gardens: Old Istanbul Gardens in Particular. METU Faculty of
Architecture Press.
Ger, G., & Kravets, O. (2009). Special and Ordinary Times: Tea in motion. In Time,
Consumption and Everyday Life: Practice, materiality and culture (pp. 189 –202).
Berg.
Gökarıksel, B. (2011). The intimate politics of secularism and the headscarf: the mall, the
neighborhood, and the public square in Istanbul. Gender, Place & Culture,
19(November 2014), 1–20.
Habermas, J. (1991). The Structural Transformation of the Public Sphere: An Inquiry
into a Category of Bourgeois Society. MIT press.
Halbwachs, M., & Coser, L. A. (1992). On collective memory. University of Chicago
Press Chicago.
Hamadeh, S. (2008). The City’s Pleasures: Istanbul in the Eighteenth Century. Seattle:
University of Washington Press.
Hanley, W. (2008). Grieving Cosmopolitanism in Middle East Studies. History Compass,
6(5), 1346–1367.
Hattox, R. (2000). Coffee and Coffeehouses. University of Washington Press.
Hebbert, M. (2005). The street as locus of collective memory. Environment and Planning
D: Society and Space, 23(4), 581–596.
Heper, M. (2011). Does Secularism Face a Serious Threat? In B. Turam (Ed.), Secular
State and Religious Society: Two Forces in Play in Turkey (pp. 79–94). Palgrave
Macmillan.
Houston, C. (2001). The Brewing of Islamist Modernity: Tea Gardens and Public Space
in Istanbul. Theory, Culture & Society, 18(6), 77–97.
Isin, E. (2003). Everyday life in Istanbul. Yapi Kredi Yayinlari.
Johnson, C. (1922). Constantinople today: the Pathfinder survey of Constantinople: a
study in oriental social life. Macmillan.
Kapoor, I. (2002). Deliberative Democracy or Agonistic Pluralism? the Relevance of the
Habermas-Mouffe Debate for Third World Politics. Alternatives: Global, Local,
Political, 27(4), 459–488.
Kasaba, R., & Bozdogan, S. (1997). Rethinking modernity and national identity in
Turkey. Rethinking modernity and national identity in Turkey (Vol. 1). University of
Washington Press.
Kingwell, M. (2001). The World We Want: Virtue, Vice, and the Good Citizen. Penguin
Canada.
Kucukcan, T. (2003). State, Islam, and Religious Liberty in Modern Turkey:
Reconfiguration of Religion in the Public Sphere. Brigham Young University Law
Review, 2, 475–506.
Lofland, L. (1998). The Public Realm: Exploring the City’s Quintessential Social
Territory. Transaction Publishers.
MacDougall, E. B., & Ettinghausen, R. (1974). The Islamic Garden: Dumbarton Oaks
Colloquium on the History of Landscape Architecture IV. Dumbarton Oaks Trustees
for Harvard University.
Melling, A. I. (1807). Voyage pittoresque de Constantinople et des rives du Bosphore [A
Picturesque Voyage to Constantinople and the Shores of the Bosphorus]. imp. de P.
Didot l’ainé.
Mikhail, A. (2007). The Heart’s Desire: Gender, Urban Space and the Ottoman Coffee
House. In D. Sajdi (Ed.), Ottoman Tulips, Ottoman Coffee : Leisure and Lifestyle in
the Eighteenth Century (p. 161). Tauris Academic Studies.
Mills, A. (2010). Streets of Memory: Landscape, Tolerance, and National Identity in
Istanbul. Univ. of Georgia Press.
Mills, A. (2011). The Ottoman Legacy: Urban Geographies, National Imaginaries, and
Global Discourses of Tolerance. Comparative Studies of South Asia, Africa and the
Middle East, 31(1), 183–195.
Mouffe, C. (1999). Deliberative Democracy or Agonistic Pluralism. Social Research,
66(3).
Moynihan, E. (1979). Paradise As a Garden: In Persia and Mughal India. George
Braziller.
Nora, P. (1989). Between Memory and History : Les Lieux de Memoire [The sites of
Memory]. Representations, (26), 7–24.
Oldenburg, R. (1989). The Great Good Place: Cafes, Coffee Shops, Community Centers,
Beauty Parlors, General Stores, Bars, Hangouts and How They Get You Through the
Day (1st ed.). Paragon House.
Onay, N., & Uğurlu, A. (2010). A public meeting point : “ Sebil ” of Nuruosmaniye. ITU
A|Z, 7(1), 38–53.
Ors, I. (2002). Coffeehouses, Cosomopolitanism, and Pluralizing Modernities In Istanbul.
Journal of Mediterranean Studies, 12(1), 119–145.
Ors, I. (2014). Genie in the bottle: Gezi Park, Taksim Square, and the realignment of
democracy and space in Turkey. Philosophy & Social Criticism, 40, 489–498.
Ozkocak, A. (2007). Coffehouses: Rethinking the Public and Private in Early Modern
Istanbul. Journal of Urban History, 33(6), 965–986.
Redford, S. (2000). Just Landscape in Medieval Anatolia. Studies in the History of
Gardens & Designed Landscapes, 20(4), 313–324.
Robins, K., & Aksoy, A. (1995). Istanbul Rising. European Urban and Regional Studies,
2(3), 223.
Sargin, G. A. (2004). Displaced memories, or the architecture of forgetting and
remembrance. Environment and Planning D: Society and Space, 22(5), 659–680.
Schimmel, A. (1976). The Celestial Garden (Vol. 4, pp. 13–39). Dumbarton Oaks.
Seckin, Y. (2003). Gardens of the nineteenth-century imperial palaces in Istanbul. Studies
in the History of Gardens & Designed Landscapes, 23(1), 72–86.
Secor, A. (2004). “There is an Istanbul that belongs to me”: citizenship, space, and
identity in the city. Annals of the Association of American Geographers, 94(2), 352–
368.
Tokman, A. (2001). Negotiating Tradition, Modernity And Identity In Consumer Space :
A Study Of A Shopping Mall And Revived Coffeehouse. Bilkent University Ankara.
Turam, B. (2012). Secular State and Religious Society. New York: Palgrave Macmillan.
Turam, B. (2013). The Primacy of Space in Politics: Bargaining Rights, Freedom and
Power in an Istanbul Neighborhood. International Journal of Urban and Regional
Research, 37(2), 409–429.
i Lyn Lofland (1998) argues that many of Oldenburg’s third spaces are in fact “locations” (parochial) rather than
“locales” (public). Parochial spaces, while seemingly open to all are, in practice, sites of gathering for those who
already share common belief systems – wherein these can become more firmly entrenched.
ii For a discussion on how memory is captured in space see (Halbwachs & Coser, 1992)